Conjuring 1814 Vienna at the Nathaniel Allen House in West Newton on Saturday, Newton Baroque invited us to join them in the salon of Fanny von Arnstein, socialite and musician, for an intimate evening of Lieder and keyboard fantasies. Accompanied by director Andrus Madsen on fortepiano, singers Jason McStoots, Charles Blandy, and Shiba Nemat-Nasser brought to life the songs of CPE Bach, Mozart, and Meyerbeer. Interspersed among them, Madsen dazzled us with keyboard fantasies by Mozart and the Bach sons, while also offering two of his own improvisations in the same style. During intermission, our gracious hosts offered us wine and snacks, while the musicians mingled with the guests, heightening the impression of an early 19^th -century salon in an 1848 Greek Revival mansion.

To further the intimacy of a Viennese salon, the musicians placed themselves quite close to the small audience. This allowed us to see every small facial expression and gesture as a depiction of subtle characterization and emotion. Nemat-Nasser played the role of jilted lover in Mozart’s Als Luisa die Briefe, K520, aided by a prop of folded paper tied with string to represent the letters from an unfaithful lover her character threw on the fire. At the end of the song, she dramatically tossed the stack of letters on the floor to punctuate the final cadence. McStoots in particular excelled with his theatrical sense of character. Fresh off his portrayal of Belshazzar in the Boston Camerata’s production of Daniel a few weeks ago, he met the challenge head on in Schubert’s “Erlkönig” using expression, gesture, and even posture to distinguish each of the characters in the narrative ballad. The narrator, the stern father, the horrified child, and the creepy Erlking came to life in front of us though both voice and gesture. Notably, Madsen took the famously difficult piano accompaniment somewhat slower than most. While this did lessen the apprehension—even terror—that Schubert’s Opus One typically evokes, the fortepianist gave us the space to savor each character in McStoots’s portrayal. This fresh take on a beloved work invited us to listen as if in the composer’s own Schubertiade.

Besides portrayal of character, the singers displayed great vocal skill in tackling some rather difficult repertoire. In his first offering of the evening, Blandy sang CPE Bach’s La Sophie, Wq117/14, a work that evokes the headiness of new love. With a light and agile instrument, Blandy tackled the thorny melismas of Bach’s Lied with great vocal skill and sensitivity to the emotion of the poem. Nemat-Nasser showed off her powerful chest register in two Lieder with prominent low notes. The end of Meyerbeer’s “Menschenfeindlich” drops to a low A on the final iteration of the repeated word “Allein!” forcefully conveying the loneliness of the poem’s speaker. Near the end of the evening, Nemat-Nasser gave us a thoughtful rendition of Schubert’s “Tod und das Mädchen,” a piece heard less often than its namesake string quartet. The intersection of vocal skill and characterization shone in Nemat-Nasser’s portrayal of the two figures, especially in Death’s final low D. Yet, she gave no sign of strain or fatigue in reaching to the depths of that register so late in the evening.

With thematic groupings, Newton Baroque drew poignant emotional connections among the stylistically quite distinct numbers. But, it was Madsen’s keyboard fantasies that truly startled and delighted us. Sitting down to his 1770s Stein replica fortepiano, our host began with CPE Bach’s Fantasy in C Major, Wq61/6, which he described as full of witty jokes. Indeed, some audience members chuckled softly immediately after the opening gesture of the piece. WF Bach’s Fantasy in A Minor, which Madsen described as “batshit crazy” in an offhand quip right before launching into it, entranced us with its kaleidoscopic cycling through incongruous melodic and harmonic ideas. Following these, Madsen’s improvisations only deepened our appreciation of the genre. Drawing on his deep well of experience with the keyboard fantasy and the style of these composers, the fortepianist’s traversals revealed not only consummate technical skill, but also the fire of melodic invention that many 18^th-century writers discerned in the genre. These skills came to us again in Mozart’s unfinished Fantasy in D Minor, K397. Discarding the 8-bar ending tacked onto the work when it was published shortly after Mozart’s death, Madsen crafted his own ending. While adhering closely to Mozart’s original, he melded the composer’s material with his own musical ideas to extend and encapsulate the original. Thus, he conjured the plausible image of Mozart improvising such a fantasy in von Arnstein’s salon.

Throughout the evening, Madsen spoke eloquently about the life of von Arnstein and her significant, though often overlooked, impact on Viennese musical life as well as her connection to the composers on the program. A friend of Mozart, von Arnstein acted as patron and supporter of a young Giacomo Meyerbeer, as he began his career. Hailing from Berlin, her family had connections to the Bachs as well. The fortepianist’s passion for this music and for historically underrepresented figures came across clearly in his words. Throughout the evening, Newton Baroque captured our attention and transported us to 19^th-century Vienna as if the music and careers of beloved composers were materializing right in front of us.

Michael Goetjen, a musicologist, harpsichordist, and organist whose research focuses on 18^th-century opera and the music of Mozart, teaches at MIT and BU.